In electronic circuits, a phase delay is often introduced into a signal, for any of a variety of reasons. As one example, to ensure that two signals are synchronized with one another, a phase delay may be introduced into one of the signals. Phase delays may be introduced into signals for other reasons as well.
A circuit to introduce a phase delay into a signal may utilize an iterative approach. For instance, if a given delay circuit is capable of introducing an additional one-nanosecond delay into a given signal each time it is called, the delay circuit is called upon to update its delay a number of times in order to introduce the desired delay. As an example, if a five-nanosecond delay is desired, then the circuit may be called upon five times before the correct delay is achieved.
However, iterative approaches may have to be called a number of times to introduce the desired delay into a signal. Because of their iterative nature, for instance, these approaches are relatively slow in performance.